Tell No Lies

by Tell No Lies (retail) (epub)

  Caelan felt a blush start in her cheeks. ‘Sorry. Yes, I am. DI Hobbs made a statement too.’

  ‘I’ll check it.’ Somerville turned away, leaving Caelan feeling ridiculous.

  Achebe was in the doorway, holding up a thumb. She moved towards him, hands in her pockets.

  Time to go.

  * * *

  She turned left out of Edmonton Green station, following the pavement around the corner and under a bridge. Shops on both sides of the road, their windows advertising kebabs, property, haircuts. Further along, houses, then a post office; several Royal Mail vans were parked at the side of the road. Caelan kept her head up, her hands in her jacket pockets as people passed her without a second glance.

  She kept walking, noting road names she remembered from statements and briefings or from the news. There had been stabbings, mass brawls, shootings. As she’d told Reid and Webster, those crimes happened everywhere. But here… here, she felt fear clutch at her belly. Two men were dead. Could she be sure she was safe? She knew she had to deal with her anxiety immediately, before it had a chance to take a hold. She spotted a bus stop and headed towards it, stood with her back to the road, pretending to look at her phone as though waiting. Breathing slowly, she waited for her hurtling thoughts to become calmer. She remembered her days in uniform, being summoned to streets like these, not knowing whether a domestic disturbance might turn deadly, a fight in a pub end up a murder scene. She had survived, never been injured. At least in her undercover role she was in control, could decide whether to keep going or back away. It was nerve-racking, exhilarating, and occasionally terrifying. She thought again about the ultimatum Elizabeth Beckett had given her, and knew she had made the right decision. Her job was all she had. She lived for it, whatever the cost.

  A kid zipped by on a BMX, hood up, head down low. He’d been close enough to touch. Caelan watched him jam on the brakes, bringing the bike to a halt at the side of the pavement, outside a church. He pulled his phone from his pocket and held it up to his ear. She slowed her pace, wanting to hear what he was saying, but soon he was off again, waiting for a gap in the traffic before disappearing across the road.

  She kept walking, not going directly to where she knew Bryce’s body had been discovered but taking the longer route she had planned before leaving the incident room. She needed to look like she belonged, not to have to keep checking where she was on her phone.

  Another residential street, semi-detached houses and cars lining both sides of the road. Speed bumps.

  Then, footsteps behind her. Not hurrying, not running, but close enough to cause concern. A muffled comment, a burst of laughter. More than one person. Local accents. Male. Young.

  Her stomach tightening, Caelan maintained her pace. She wouldn’t allow them to intimidate her. As she walked, she listened carefully, trying to determine how many there were. They weren’t speaking now, and she guessed they were concentrating on getting as close to her as possible.

  If there had been a shop or pub on the street, she would have turned into it, regardless of her plan. There wasn’t. The road stretched in front of her, battered fences and overgrown hedges separating the houses from the street. Caelan licked her lips, suddenly dry, and slid her hands out of her jacket pockets. She doubted they would try anything on the street, but who knew? She had been trained in unarmed combat, was confident in her ability to keep herself safe, but if there were four or five of them, what chance would she have? She had zipped her phone into the inside pocket of her jacket too. She could get it out, but perhaps that was what they were waiting for. Maybe the idea was to intimidate her so she felt she needed to call for help, then grab the phone from her hand. There was a police station nearby, but from what she remembered of the street view, she would have to turn and walk the other way. There was no through route from here.

  Another burst of laughter. They were even closer. Caelan felt fury build in her chest. They were halfway along the street now. Abruptly she turned to her right and marched out into the road. She heard scuffling feet as they changed course behind her. As she approached the end of the road, cars speeding by on the street it joined, she made up her mind.

  She stopped, spun around.

  There were three of them, boys aged around sixteen, all wearing tracksuit bottoms, trainers, sweatshirts with the hoods up. Two of them had bandannas tied around their necks, ready to pull up to conceal their faces if necessary. Caelan kept her expression blank, knowing that to show any fear would be a mistake. The boy in the middle grinned at her.

  ‘What?’ he sneered. ‘Where you going? You’re not from around here.’

  Caelan paused, knew her accent had to be convincing. ‘Visiting my mate.’

  ‘Your mate?’ He took a step towards her, baring his teeth in an approximation of a smile. ‘Where’s this mate of yours live then?’

  Thinking quickly, Caelan recalled a name from the streets she’d looked at earlier. ‘Leonard Road.’

  He laughed, spat on the pavement at her feet. ‘Yeah? Going the long way round, are you?’

  ‘I got lost, all right? I’ve never been here before.’

  Looking her up and down, he smiled. ‘Yeah, I can see that. ’Cos if you had, you’d know there are streets in this area you stay away from. And this is one of them.’

  ‘I didn’t—’

  ‘Why don’t you go back where you came from?’ He nodded down at her trainers. ‘Nice shoes. Ever use them for running?’

  Caelan stared at him. ‘What?’

  He shoved his hands into his trouser pockets, rocked back on his heels, his eyes half closed. Enjoying her discomfort. ‘I want to see you run. Go on, fuck off. Don’t let us see you round here again.’

  She narrowed her eyes, wanting to drive her fist into his face as he stepped even closer. He lifted his hand. Caelan tensed, knowing she could have him on the ground in seconds, also aware that his friends would be on her soon after. It would be suicide.

  He touched her bruised cheek with a fingertip almost tenderly, then shoved her shoulder so she staggered backwards. Caelan was silent, not reacting as she straightened up. ‘Go. Now.’ He laughed. ‘And fucking run!’

  Rage building in her belly, Caelan did so, sprinting for the end of the street. Their laughter chased her along. She ran around the corner and stopped dead. People were staring, and one car tooted its horn, the man in the driver’s seat sticking his thumb out of the window at her. Caelan risked a glance down the street, wondering if they were coming after her. They weren’t. They’d turned around, sauntering back the way they had come, no doubt believing they’d scared her off. She saw a café across the road and headed towards it. She wasn’t far from the road where Anthony Bryce’s body had been found, but a break wouldn’t hurt. The encounter with the three youths had shaken her more than she wanted to admit. She didn’t believe she had ever been in real danger, but their casual certainty that they had the right to say who walked around here made her furious.

  The café was run-down, empty. Specials were scrawled on fluorescent cardboard stars, Blu-Tacked to the wall. Behind a chipped wooden counter, a sulky-looking girl stood staring at her phone. Caelan took a bottle of water from the fridge in the corner and scanned the meagre display of chocolate bars and cellophane-wrapped biscuits and flapjacks. She selected a chocolate chip cookie and set it and the water on the counter. The girl took her time ringing the items into the till. She stared at Caelan without speaking as she handed over a five-pound note, leaving her change on the counter and going back to her phone.

  Caelan flashed her a smile. ‘Thanks so much.’

  The girl scowled, managed a nod.

  At a table in a corner, Caelan sipped her water and took out her phone. Two missed calls from the new head of their unit, Commander Ian Penrith. Shit. No doubt he wanted to see her, to ask why she’d gone haring off to Edmonton despite the operation she had been dragged back to work for being delayed. She put the phone back in her pocket. She would have to speak to him, but
not here, and not yet.

  Out on the street, a fine drizzle had begun to fall. Hunching her shoulders, she began to walk. Cars sped by, but there were fewer pedestrians now, no doubt driven inside by the rain. As she turned the corner into the street where Bryce’s body had been found, Caelan saw the crowd. Undeterred by the weather, a group of twenty or so stood in the middle of the road, where a marked police car was parked. Some were drinking from beer cans; most were smoking or vaping. Caelan strode up as though she belonged. If the three lads who had followed her were around, she’d have to keep her head down, but they weren’t going to stop her following Achebe’s instructions. Two men were dead, and the people who had tortured and killed them were probably still walking these streets. Maybe they were even part of this crowd.

  She pushed closer, standing on tiptoe to try to see over the heads of the people in front of her. She spotted the familiar blue and white POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS tape preventing bystanders from pushing too close to the crime scene. A male uniformed officer stood just beyond the tape, his hands behind his back. Caelan didn’t envy him as the rain fell harder.

  ‘What’s happened?’ She turned to the woman standing beside her, who had two sleeping babies in a huge pushchair and was eating a sausage roll from a paper bag.

  ‘There’s a dead body. Murdered, they’re saying.’ She spoke with relish, through a mouthful of pastry.

  Caelan altered her expression so she looked suitably shocked. ‘Who is it?’

  The woman took another bite, chewed vigorously. ‘Don’t know. Some bloke.’ She swallowed. ‘I’ve been here half an hour, and no one’s come out. Reckon it’s a wind-up?’

  ‘Could be. But why would they have taped the road off if it was?’

  An elderly bearded man in front of them turned. ‘I heard it’s a stabbing.’

  The woman rolled her eyes. ‘Another one? I’m not hanging around then.’ She screwed up the now empty paper bag and dropped it onto the pavement. ‘No TV cameras, no armed police, nothing. Fuck this, I’m getting soaked. I’m going home.’ She gave the pushchair a shove, turned it around and disappeared.

  Caelan glanced about her, scanning the nearby faces. No one familiar, no one talking furtively on their phone or to their companion. No one looking frightened or traumatised. Not even anyone with blood stains on their clothing or an iron in their hand. She stepped to her right, trying to inch her way closer to the police cordon. Murmured conversations were going on all around her, but she heard nothing suspicious. Maybe she was wasting her time here. Her phone was ringing, and she checked the display. Ian Penrith again. She switched it to silent without answering.

  Caelan waited ten minutes longer, but there was no movement behind the cordon. People were beginning to drift away, talking about collecting children from school and what they were going to have for dinner. She checked her phone and made the decision.

  * * *

  ‘Where the hell have you been all day?’ Ian Penrith folded his hands over his belly as he leaned back in his chair. He wore a crumpled white shirt, his navy tie loosened. Looking her up and down, he said, ‘Nice outfit. Is that what all the bright young things in Edmonton are wearing this season?’

  Caelan sat opposite him, crossed her legs.

  ‘If you know, why are you asking?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You wanted to know where I’d been.’

  ‘I was informed you were needed. Then, suddenly, you weren’t. Was it unreasonable of me to expect you back here? You know, where you’re supposed to be based?’

  ‘I’m supposed to be on sick leave.’

  He waved a hand, dismissing the idea. ‘We all know you’ve no life outside your job, Caelan.’

  ‘Too kind. And you have?’

  A smirk. ‘Never claimed otherwise. You, on the other hand, had a stab at happiness.’

  ‘You knew, Ian. You knew Nicky wasn’t dead.’

  He didn’t deny it, just sat looking at her, his head tipped to one side. ‘No comment. Anyway, she’s back now. You can play happy families.’

  Caelan stared at him. ‘What? Are you joking?’

  ‘Not welcoming her with open arms then?’ He sniffed, pulled a grubby handkerchief from his trouser pocket and blew his nose. ‘She had no choice, Caelan.’

  ‘Of course she did. I’m not going to discuss this with you.’

  ‘Fine.’ His voice changed. ‘Why are you getting involved in the death of Ben Rainey?’

  ‘Getting involved? Elizabeth Beckett asked me—’

  He held up a finger. ‘No, Caelan. Assistant Commissioner Beckett asked you to assist with gathering information about the drugs scene in Edmonton.’

  ‘You’ve heard about Anthony Bryce, whose body was found today? His death and Rainey’s are linked.’

  ‘Because you say so?’

  ‘What? No, because they were killed in the same way.’

  ‘But they weren’t. Bryce was strangled, Rainey was stabbed.’ He grinned at her. ‘Come on, Caelan, this is basic stuff. Making assumptions, surmising. Is there proof the same person or people killed them both?’

  She wasn’t going to allow him to provoke her. ‘Achebe said—’

  ‘That they were both tortured. I know. Listen, Caelan, you’re needed this evening.’

  ‘Needed? What do you mean?’

  He sat up straighter, ran a hand over his sparse hair. ‘We’ve had a request for an undercover officer. One night only.’

  ‘Doing what?’ Caelan rubbed her brow, a headache beginning to make its presence felt.

  ‘Oh, lying around.’ Penrith didn’t bother to hide his smirk.

  ‘What?’

  ‘There’s a hotel in Hackney that some of the Stoke Newington lot have been sniffing around. It’s a dump. I wouldn’t let my dog sleep there.’

  ‘You don’t have a dog.’

  ‘All right, I wouldn’t let my ex-wife sleep there.’ He bared his teeth. ‘No, of course I would. I’d book her in for a fortnight.’

  ‘I get the idea. What’s our interest?’

  ‘It’s a cover for a brothel. The whisper is, some of the girls aren’t there by choice.’

  ‘Trafficking?’

  ‘They think so. Stoke Newington have an informer inside. Bouncer type, throws out clients if they get too rough. Seems he has a conscience. He’d not been working there long when he guessed what was really going on.’

  ‘And he came to us?’

  ‘He’ll be protected, after we arrest him for show, of course. As well as renting out rooms complete with prostitutes, they also let them by the hour to working girls.’

  ‘Let me guess. I’m going to be one of those girls?’

  ‘Bingo.’ He pointed a meaty finger at her. ‘Maybe you could lose the bandage? Not very glamorous.’

  She lifted a hand to her cheek. ‘And the bruises are?’

  ‘Blame a client.’ His face hardened. ‘The girls will understand, that’s for sure.’

  ‘Can’t Nicky—’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  Penrith rubbed his mouth. ‘She’s in Edmonton.’

  Surprised, Caelan leaned forward. ‘Nicky is? Why?’

  ‘Don’t ask me. I’m only her commanding officer.’

  What the hell? ‘We were told the Edmonton operation wasn’t happening yet.’

  ‘I know. And yet you were there earlier today.’

  ‘Come on, Ian, what was I supposed to do? Come back here, wait around? I’m a police officer. If I’m not required on an undercover operation, I’m supposed to be working on other cases, aren’t I?’

  ‘I’m not disputing that.’

  ‘Then what’s the problem?’

  ‘Why did you go to see Ben Rainey’s family? DI Hobbs?’ He was watching her face. Caelan shook her head.

  ‘You know about that?’

  ‘Telling DI Hobbs that a car deliberately crashed into her?’ He snorted. ‘You’re complicating matters, Caelan. Sticking your oar in. Looking
for conspiracies. Just because Nasenby was dirty doesn’t mean every officer in the Met is.’

  ‘I’m aware of that. But why was Ben Rainey tortured? He must have known something.’

  ‘You’re doing it again. There’s no “must”. How do you know he wasn’t grabbed by someone who just enjoys hurting people? Who knew he was a copper? A gang initiation, or even a case of mistaken identity? We don’t know why he was killed, and you upsetting his family and rattling cages all over London isn’t going to help.’

  ‘DCI Achebe said they have nothing. No clue who killed him, or why. Then another body’s found and I’m supposed to ignore the link?’

  Penrith’s cheeks reddened. ‘Yes, that’s exactly what you’re supposed to do. It’s not your case, not your problem. Let Tim Achebe worry about it. You’re going to be busy in Hackney.’

  Caelan stood, knowing this was an argument she wasn’t going to win. Bickering with Penrith was a waste of her time.

  ‘Where’s this hotel?’

  He didn’t need to check. ‘Be at Finsbury Park tube station at nine this evening. You’ll be picked up nearby.’

  ‘By?’

  ‘A DC Bailey. He’s your client for the evening.’ Penrith waggled his eyebrows.

  ‘And what, we rent a room then go wandering through the premises?’

  ‘You’ve done this type of thing before. Let Bailey take the lead.’

  She snorted. ‘Depends on what I think of him.’

  Penrith pushed back his chair. ‘I have a meeting, Caelan. About Michael Nasenby. Don’t let me keep you.’

  Her stomach jolted. ‘Michael? What has he… Has he admitted to anything?’

  ‘I’ve no idea.’ Penrith checked his watch. ‘Hard for him to deny his involvement after the conversation you had with him.’

  ‘He’ll try.’

  ‘I’ve no doubt. How’s your assistant, by the way?’

  ‘Ewan? I’m told he’s recovering at home.’

  Penrith yanked his suit jacket from the back of his chair. ‘You mean you haven’t been to see him? Poor show, Caelan.’